“You think man can destroy the planet? What intoxicating vanity. Let me tell you about our planet. Earth is four-and-a-half-billion-years-old. There's been life on it for nearly that long, 3.8 billion years. Bacteria first; later the first multi-cellular life, then the first complex creatures in the sea, on the land. Then finally the great sweeping ages of animals, the amphibians, the dinosaurs, at last the mammals, each one enduring millions on millions of years, great dynasties of creatures rising, flourishing, dying away -- all this against a background of continuous and violent upheaval. Mountain ranges thrust up, eroded away, cometary impacts, volcano eruptions, oceans rising and falling, whole continents moving, an endless, constant, violent change, colliding, buckling to make mountains over millions of years. Earth has survived everything in its time. It will certainly survive us.

If all the nuclear weapons in the world went off at once and all the plants, all the animals died and the earth was sizzling hot for a hundred thousand years, life would survive, somewhere: under the soil, frozen in Arctic ice. Sooner or later, when the planet was no longer inhospitable, life would spread again. The evolutionary process would begin again. It might take a few billion years for life to regain its present variety. Of course, it would be very different from what it is now, but the earth would survive our folly, only we would not.

If the ozone layer gets thinner, ultraviolet radiation sears the earth, so what? Ultraviolet radiation is good for life. It's powerful energy. It promotes mutation, change. Many forms of life will thrive with more UV radiation. Many others will die out.

Do you think this is the first time that's happened? Think about oxygen. Necessary for life now, but oxygen is actually a metabolic poison, a corrosive gas, like fluorine. When oxygen was first produced as a waste product by certain plant cells some three billion years ago, it created a crisis for all other life on earth. Those plants were polluting the environment, exhaling a lethal gas. Earth eventually had an atmosphere incompatible with life. Nevertheless, life on earth took care of itself.

In the thinking of the human being a hundred years is a long time. A hundred years ago we didn't have cars, airplanes, computers or vaccines. It was a whole different world, but to the earth, a hundred years is nothing. A million years is nothing. This planet lives and breathes on a much vaster scale. We can't imagine its slow and powerful rhythms, and we haven't got the humility to try. We've been residents here for the blink of an eye. If we're gone tomorrow, the earth will not miss us.”

We are flawed, making mistakes and compounding them with incorrect assumptions because of the guilt we feel over what we've wrongly done. Our guilt has caused us (as a society) to choose to decide not that we've been blessed with a planet that is in the perfect position in relationship with a star, where the climate is temperate and that there was enough Water on the planet to support life. Instead, we've decided not to choose that the circumstances are perfect for life is considered to be only a random occurrence.We're not thankful for the inventions and innovations that we've come up with that make life easier every day or for the men with the intellect to have the vision and understanding of what they've learned to design and produce things that make our lives easier. I'll go a step farther and dip into Christianity: In Chapter 1 of his letter to the members of the church in Rome, Paul speaks of "not acknowledging or thanking our creator" and "our worship of the created rather than the creator." God's Wrath on Unrighteousness

18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world,[a] in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. 24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. 26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. 28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. 29 They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents,

I understand the thoughts of non-followers on Judeo-Christianity and its worldview. However, I believe that there is a lot of wisdom to be found in this the Bible and in this passage.

We need to give thanks for what we have. In giving thanks, we do not focus on ourselves. Focusing on ourselves is what creates megalomaniacs like our current President, who is sure that only he can show the rest of us the error in our ways and lead us back to where (he thinks) we ought to be.

We need to be humble and understand that we play but a small part in the great community that is earth. Without humility, once again, we focus purely on ourselves.

"Claiming to be wise, they became fools...." Isn't that what ALWAYS HAPPENS when we are too proud and too smart? We know it all (and are only too happy to tell others about where they've screwed up). We begin to worship our self. Then neurosis begins to set in.

"GOD gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of Unrighteousness, Evil, Covetousness. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of GOD, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil disobedient to parents...." Don't these descriptive terms seem awfully familiar in deed, if not in word? That's because it's how we've described our "best and brightest, the ones who we've been waiting for." And all of this comes from not being thankful for anything and focusing solely on yourself.

Of course, being thankful for something, implies being thankful to someone that has provided and given it to you, which in and of itself implies a creator and divine intelligence. Many people can't or won't go there, but I believe that is the crux of our issues.So as our society has turned away from GOD our guilt is too much for us to bear and we are wracked with it until we've gone mad. And now, those most successful and, indeed, the most guilt wracked, now demand that we sacrifice, in a ritual of self immolation to a god, made in their own image, that doesn't exist in order to achieve his absolution for their ease of lifestyle.So whether you follow the creationist viewpoint and believe in a young earth (about 7,000 years) or "the (current) scientific" viewpoint and believe in an old earth, even up to 4 BILLION YEARS in age, I have a thought on what's happened and why the hysteria over Being Green isn't worth the worry that people put into it.Ironically (and I'm not trying to be a racist here), the (secular) Jews (who've turned from their religious beliefs) seem to be leading this charge. Carl Sagan was seen as one of the most brilliant scientists in our lifetime and Daniel Greenfield unmasks him as the mentally sick man that he was. Sagan, taken to his logical extreme should have committed suicide (as soon as he had completed his coherent thoughts about life). As citizens of the human race, we need to recognize that we are going to die. Our time here is short. If we are going to die anyway, why worry over it?

That doesn't give us the right to trash the environment, while we reside here. We do need to "give a care" and treat where we live with respect. In the older days, this concept was called Stewardship. It is well defined as the activity or job of protecting and being responsible for something orthe careful and responsible management of something entrusted to one's care. In the past, a steward was defined as someone who protects or is responsible for money, property, etc. and as a person whose job is to manage the land and property of another person. Today, that term is unfashionable, as going green means we must sacrifice all other aspects of managing the earth's resources, in order that those resources can be conserved, as if Humans had never been here.

So in discussing this Green Socialism, we should ask those advocate for it to just shorten the time and cut to the chase. If Sagan had done this, at least we wouldn't have to have listened to this mental excrement.

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About Me

I'm one of the last of the Baby Boomers, married to another one of them. We live in middle class suburbia, in what used to be a small town, but is now a bedroom community of a City large enough to have a professional sports team.
We've raised 2 kids the old fashioned way, with my wife staying at home on a middle class income, while paying off debt. She home schooled both of them thanks to liberal home school laws , (however, we had to have them End of Grade Tested Each Year). We're politically conservative, Reformed Church Followers and Disciples of Christ. trying to live our lives with purpose.
I'm just trying to keep my head down and not bother anyone, but be available when someone needs me.